Treasure Hunt

Don’t you just love genealogy! It is like being on a treasure hunt. I find it such a fascinating hobby. History is one of my favorite interests, so getting to know who some of the participants are in your own family history is just great.

I’ve been having chats with my Mom about her grandmother, my great-greandmother, “Grammy Cobb” who’s second husband was Jeremiah Cobb of Madison Street in Wrentham, MA. Bertha (Wood) Mitchell was first married to William W. Mitchell. They were were the parents of my grandfather, Nelson B. Mitchell. I grew up on Madison Street so it makes it interesting for me to know how the family wound up there.

Apparently, Bertha lived in New Hampshire with William who passed away when she still had two young boys at home. She became employed as a housekeeper eventually by Mr. Cobb, several years her senior, and moved to Wrentham. I’m still trying to get some more facts about this.

What is really cool is that the very house that the Cobbs lived in at the end of Madison Street, close to Rt. 1, was visited by my husband as a child. His older sister and family rented the home after Donald Mitchell my grandfather’s brother who had lived in the home since childhood, moved out in the early 1960’s. It is an interesting weaving of history when I can learn about the house from memories of both my husband’s side and my side of the family.

What little I know is that it was one of the oldest homesteads in Wrentham. Cobbs migrated from Dedham, MA to Wrentham. Jeremiah Cobbwas born in 1877 according to an 1880 and 1930 censuses and resided in Wrentham. The 1880 census reports that his father was Samuel A. Cobb, a laborer (30 y/o), whose wife Katherine B. Hawes who had 4 sons and 1 daughter, Jeremiah was 3 at the time. This family of 7 shared their homestead with a female cousin and a male laborer. Perhaps the 19 y/o young lady helped as a servant/nanny while the 51 y/o fellow worked on the farm. I am not certain if this was the same residence, that Jeremiah and Bertha inhabited, but it very well could have been.

My husband has early memories of visiting a big old white farm house white a farmer’s porch. He recalls an old delapated cabin in the back woods. “The witch lived there”. He remembers a brook on the property.

My Mom tells me about the house where she spent time with Grammy and Grampy Cobb. The house was equipped with a water pump in the kitchen an old fashioned stove where Grammy baked her Molasses cookies. She baked them without a measuring utensils . . . a handful of this, a pinch of that . . . so you never knew just how they would taste. There was a room off the house that had floor boards that could be lifted that a brook ran through where water could be retrieved. Mom was always afraid she might fall in. It was a place for cool storage also so it may have served as a spring house. There was a two holer outhouse in the back. There was also a cabin well out behind the house that may have been for the laborer or even an original home. Back inside, the living room had a wall that was cornered off. It was behind this wall that the family used to hide from the Indians said Grammy Cobb. I am uncertain when this took place. Above the fire was a beautiful large painting of Niagara Falls in a guilt frame.

Grammy and Grampy Cobb attended the Attleboro Advent Christian Church. Grampy, Jeremiah, used to take his horse and buggy to church. Later he had his driver’s license, but was better with the harness than the steering wheel. The Attleboro Advent Christian Church is where my mother’s parent’s Nelson Mitchell and Virginia Walton met. And the rest, I shall say, is history.

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One thought on “Treasure Hunt”

Hi, I stumbled across your site an dthought it most interesting. I have a photo on mine of BERTHA WOOD and am curious if she is the same one you write of. She is in 2 photos with a group of other people and her name was written on the photo with an arrow showing her place in the snapshot. Please take a look. you may be able to assist me in getting the near 200 ohotos to their next of kin:)
Thanx!
Lee